Record numbers of cancers are being detected at a Nottingham NHS breast screening centre.
Figures from the city's Breast Institute, which screens 30,000 women a year, also show that survival rates are improving.
Advances in screening mean cancers less than 1.5cms in diameter, too small to detect manually, account for more than a third of the 1,800 picked up.
The centre said it expected two thirds of women to survive the disease.
Missed appointments
Doctors said despite a 50% increase in incidents of breast cancer over the past 30 years, the outlook for patients had improved.
Douglas Macmillan, a consultant the City Hospital, said: "We expect two thirds of women to survive breast cancer and about 80% of women to still be alive 10 years after treatment.
"This is enormously better than it was 30 years ago, where the level was more like 50%.
"This is down to earlier screening, greater awareness, better treatments and better targeted treatments suited to the individual."
But he admitted more work had to be done in dealing with the one in five women in the East Midlands who did not take up the offer of screening.
source: bbc.co.uk
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